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which, at all events in the education of the young, attends upon 
the working of a really scientific mind. Such a mind would find 
the necessity of holding even that which seems proven, in some 
sense in a state of uncertainty, admitting the possibility of the 
whole ground having to be gone over again, resulting in the 
subject being viewed in some new and perhaps truer light. 
I am no astronomer, but I inquire of one who truly is such, the 
exact distance of the sun from the earth. The astronomer gives 
me an immense amount of most valuable and correct infor- 
mation, but the dogmatic reply is not forthcoming. What 
then have I to teach my children ? Of course I cannot send 
them to the great astronomer, but am fain to let them take 
their chance of instruction from those who are the more 
fitted for the office of teacher by cherishing no doubts on the 
subject. 
In the practical application of scientific research, I have 
always found that facile belief in authority is the characteristic 
of feeble minds, and that in mastering any subject, it is 
necessary to begin ab ovo, and to prove the ground step by 
step, without relying too implicitly on the information given 
by those who have preceded in the path. 
But what would be the effect of such teaching on the 
masses of mankind ? 
It seems to me a great misfortune that science should ever 
have sullied her fair fame by attempts to soar into regions 
of philosophy. She thus incurs the blame of being an enemy 
to religion, and disqualifies herself from the task of instructing 
the rising generation. 
If science had limited herself to her own department, 
her title to the good office of expanding the mind might have 
been generally admitted. But when we have the claims of 
science set forth as if she really could educate the heart, the 
common sense of mankind instinctively revolts from the 
presumption involved in these dogmatic assertions of her 
advocates. 
In order to bring this Address to a profitable conclusion, I 
am compelled to draw on the resources of my own experience. 
Most especially, then, I must say that a more cheerful and 
a far more Scriptural view of Christian life and duty has very 
extensively driven away the clouds of puritanical gloom which 
had settled down in what was in my youth called the 
“ serious” part of the Christian world. As I was (though not 
religious) naturally “ serious,” I never could see this to be 
the proper definition of the believing portion of mankind, who 
have more right to be called the “cheerful” section. 
